Mexican Government Prepares to Expel Zapatistas from Bioreserve

Indigenous communities in the region of Montes Azules in the deep
jungle of Chiapas report military preparations for their removal from
the region. Under the pretext of "environmental protection," the Vicente
Fox administration has been threatening to relocate hundreds of indigenous
families, most of them members of Zapatista support communities. According
to La Jornada journalist Herman Bellinghausen, the question is not "protect
or not protect the environment," but rather "who is going to protect
it and how."

Many observers see the relocation as part of the Fox administration's
development project for the region, called Plan Puebla Panama. Bio-diversity
is of great strategic importance, and PPP calls for access to the region's
abundant bio-diversity by transnational corporations rather than indigenous
communities. Several US environmental organizations, led by Conservancy
International, support "no people" environmental policies and are in
the process of purchasing "environmental corridors" throughout the region,
using corporate funds. Conservancy International maintains a camp complete
with trailers in the same area from which they are calling for the expulsion
of indigenous communities.

Meanwhile, the Mexican Commission for Defense and Promotion of Human
Rights accused Governor Pablo Salazar of tolerating the presence of
paramilitary groups rather than prosecuting them for human rights violations.
In recent months paramilitary activities have been on the increase,
with several reports every week from human rights groups in Chiapas.
While members of paramilitaries have been released from prison, including
several convicted in the 1997 Acteal massacre, the number of Zapatista
political prisoners has increased recently from 9 to 24.

Governor Salazar is causing divisions in many regions of Zapatista
influence by offering land titles and government assistance for land
that was liberated in the 1994 uprising. Several groups that previously
collaborated closely with the Zapatistas are willing to accept Salazar's
offers, causing serious divisions in some communities. By mutual agreement,
the liberated lands were declared communal, and Zapatista communities
refuse to recognize the private land titles offered by the Salazar administration
to groups such as ORCAO. Some potential landowners want to win titles
for parcels so that they can be sold.

All of these actions appear to be a coordinated effort to pressure
the Zapatistas to return to peace negotiations, abandoned when successive
federal governments refused to implement the San Andres Accords.

Bush's War On International Terrorism Fixes The Zapatistas In Its
Sights

SAN CRISTOBAL DE LAS CASAS (Oct. 9th) - The Indians stood bunched
together outside the shinny appliance store on the narrow main drag
of this old colonial city, transfixed by banks of television monitors
upon which jumbo jets kept plowing into crumbling skyscrapers. "They
thought it was a movie at first" recalls the young clerk of that black
Tuesday morning, "they were talking in Tzotzil and I could not understand."

Indian responses to traumatic events, even those as close to home
as the seven year-long uprising of the largely Mayan Zapatista Army
of National Liberation (EZLN), are often heavily veiled here in this
chronically-impoverished, deeply indigenous southern state.

"We were at a meeting of women and they told us that the North Americans
had been bombed. We did not understand this at first because it is always
the North Americans who bomb other people" remembers "Irene", a member
of an artisans collective in the Zapatista highland autonomous municipality
of Aldama. Back in 1994, during the first days of the Mexican military's
campaign against the Zapatista rebels, U.S.- manufactured helicopters
dropped several bombs and Swiss jet fighters pumped U.S.-made missiles
into and around rebel villages.

This September 11th, when some of the men from Aldama arrived at Ovantic,
the EZLN's most public outpost in the Altos of Chiapas, the community
restaurant was packed and all eyes riveted on the only television screen
in town. "One companero joked that Bush was 'chichiron' (fried pork
skin) but others shushed him" recalls "Manuel", "we all saw that many
people must be dead..."

All throughout the Mayan highlands and jungle of Chiapas, whole villages
gathered around single, flickering screens trying to make sense of the
disquieting images of September 11th. In some, particularly the many
Evangelical communities that dot the conflict zone, Black Tuesday was
seen as the beginning of the end of the world - syncretically, Mayan
sacred writings anticipate the end of this world - and the beginning
of the next - between 2010 and 2012.

In other villages, observed non-government organization workers, the
attitude was "more like what are the crazy gringos up to now?

"We go into a lot of communities and they are asking us to bring them
videos of the airplanes" reports Gustavo Castro, chief analyst with
a San Cristobal think tank that initials itself CIEPAC. "The indigenas
cannot locate New York City on the map and they do not know what the
twin towers were - but they know something has changed. They are assimilating
the images and engraving them on their understandings. They have learned
that the empire is vulnerable, that the U.S. is not invincible. Does
this help them or hurt them? This is what they are weighing now..."

Although the terror attack on the U.S. has not yet provoked response
from the General Command of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation,
Subcomandante Marcos and his companeros were no doubt as mesmerized
as the rest of the world by the unimagineable images transmitted on
their car battery-powered black and white set September 11th. Tucked
away in their mountain camps above the hamlet with the haunting name
of La Realidad ("The Reality") down in the Lacandon jungle, the rebels'
Clandestine Indigenous Revolutionary Committee (CCRI) has not spoken
for five months, since May 1st, when the Mexican congress mutilated
an Indian Rights law for which they had long fought.

The Zapatistas have repeatedly been labeled terrorists by Mexican
and U.S. authorities - a current U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration
web page tags them as such, as does Diego Fernandez de Cevallos, senate
majority leader for President Vicente Fox's rightist National Action
or PAN party. Former president Ernesto Zedillo alleged the EZLN was
a terrorist organization during the first days of the 1995 economic
collapse, and sent 30,000 troops into the jungle to bring its leaders
to justice. 21 Zapatista supporters were rounded up and so charged -
"terrorism" is usually teamed up with "sedition", "subversion", and
"conspiracy" on Mexican courtroom dockets. 20 of the accused terrorists
were subsequently absolved of all charges (one militant who confessed
to toppling an electricity pylon with a pick up truck, was convicted.)

Chief of the Zapatista "terroristas" was Javier Elorriaga who spent
15 months behind bars before the charges dissolved. A mild-mannered,
pipe-smoking, Mexico City intellectual, Elorriaga is still incredulous
about the terrorism charges: "I am not a terrorist - the EZLN has historically
always been against terrorism..."

If terrorism is to be defined as the use of deadly violence against
a civilian population in order to sow fear and doubt about a government
that can no longer protect its citizens, then the Zapatistas have been
more terrorized than terroristic. The rebels' celebrated January 1st,
1994 uprising in the first hours of the North American Free Trade Agreement,
was directed at military and police forces that had suppressed Indian
social movements for decades, and not against civilians - in fact, it
was the military and police which were responsible for almost all of
the civilian loss of life during the 12-day shooting war. After less
than two weeks of armed uprising, the EZLN acceded to the demands of
the civil society to silence their guns and begin a dialogue with the
government. There have been few incidents of armed conflict since.

Although terrorism and guerrilla warfare have become synonymous in
U.S. President George Bush's declared war against the former, not all
guerrilleros are terrorists - and the EZLN is neither. Militarily, the
Zapatistas consider themselves a standing army that confronts the enemy
on the battlefield - the EZLN remains at war with the Mexican government.

Since the first week of the 1994 uprising when some ultra-left groups
sought to display their solidarity by blowing up banks and underground
parking garages, the EZLN has repeatedly condemned bombings as provocations
that only bring more repression down upon their bases - the Zapatistas
espouse mass collective pressure, rather than individual acts of terrorism,
as the most effective way to obtain social change.

In a sharp 1996 interchange with the Popular Revolutionary Army or
EPR, a group deemed responsible for multiple bombings and deadly ambushes
in which civilians have been killed (five members of a split-off group
are currently imprisoned for bombing banks this August), the EZLN's
silver-tongued spokesperson Subcomandante Marcos flatly turned down
EPR support: "we didn't ask for your support and we don't want your
support. We have different goals. We are fighting for democracy and
justice. If you ever came to power, we would have to fight you too..."

But more recently, the EZLN has asked the Popular Revolutionary Army's
endorsement of the now-moribund Indian Rights law.

Since that law was mangled by congress, the EPR has stepped up its
activities in Chiapas and is thought responsible for a series of attacks
on police-military convoys between Puerto Cate and Simijovel in the
highlands - in one terrifying attack, three military vehicles were blown
up on the open road.

In addition to denouncing left terrorism, the EZLN condemns state
terrorism - whether that of U.S.-supplied Mexican army helicopters bombing
Indian villages in Chiapas, or the United Nations carpet bombing Serbia.
The EZLN once refused to meet with a high United Nations human rights
official because of U.N. sponsorship of the bombings in the Balkans.

As if to enhance his Nostradamus-like aura, Subcomandante Marcos sometimes
prophecizes a world war much like Bush has planned against international
terrorism. In one document ("Seven Pieces of Neo-liberalism", 1997),
the Sub describes globalization as "the fragmentation of the nation-state",
later to be united in a U.S.-dominated coalition "by violence" - this
"megalopolis of power" would use terrorist attack as a pretext to seize
economic control of the planet, a scenario eerily reminiscent of Bush-Republican
congressional strategies to win "fast track" authority to negotiate
the Free Trade Treaty of the Americas" (ALCA in Spanish) and impose
NAFTA upon the entire continent, as a supposed bulwark against Bin Laden
and his terrorist gang.

Despite the threat of World War III and the impending triumph of corporate
globalization, the EZLN remains locked in a deathly still quiescence.
Indeed, the ski-masked Indian "terrorists" appear to be awaiting a very
institutional signal - a Mexican Supreme Court decision on the validity
of the gutted Indian Rights law that has been passed by congress and
promulgated by Fox. "It is as if they are giving the system one more
chance" marvels Castro, "the Zapatistas have taken the legal route.
They have dialogued and negotiated and signed agreements and held peaceful
protests - and they have gotten screwed over time! Vicente Fox ought
to be grateful to them for not being terrorists."

At this writing, 320 appeals have been filed against the Indian Rights
law with the highest court in the land by organizations such as the
National Indigenous Congress, majority-Indian municipalities (counties),
state governors, and political parties. One example: 250 indigenous
municipalities in Oaxaca filed so many petitions to block the law, that
a pick-up truck had to be hired to haul five tons of paper up to Mexico
City to deposit the appeals with the court. In Michoacan, rather than
await a court decision expected sometime early next year, the Purepecha
Nation has simply declared itself autonomous - Indian autonomy was stripped
from the law by the Mexican senate.

Indigenous autonomy is one Zapatista goal but certainly not the only
one. Still, by refusing to speak out until the high court has passed
judgment on the constitutionality of the Indian Rights law, the comandantes
have painted themselves into a silent corner at a moment when many supporters
feel keenly the absence of their voice. "They should be in the vanguard
against the coming war but they are not heard from" laments Noe Pineda,
communications director for San Cristobal's Fray Bartolome de las Casas
Human Rights Center.

Nonetheless, Bush's War against Terrorism may soon force the rebels
to speak up for their own survival. Because Chiapas is a border state
with abundant resources, it is considered a "strategic zone" for national
security. Although no count is available, hundreds of troops and immigration
agents were rushed to safeguard the southern border following the Black
Tuesday attacks. Now they are reportedly fine-combing the jungle and
the sierra for Arabs (13 Yemenis were recently picked up in Palenque),
"terrorists" (indistinct from "Arabs" although the last international
terrorist collared in Chiapas was an Austrian), and other subversives.

"Indians are always considered national security risks" remarks Marcos
Macias, the first indigino to ever head up the government's National
Indigenous Institute, "we are under permanent observation." In times
of high tension, such suspicions are not going to make life any easier
for the Mayan rebels, many of whose camps lie within 20 kilometers of
a militarized border.

Moreover, Bush's campaign against international terrorism is going
to require a lot of oil to power the war machine and EZLN jungle settlements
appear to be sitting on top of important deposits of fossil fuels -
Marcos once boasted potential reserves rivaled those of the Persian
Gulf. Intensified efforts by the Fox administration to exploit petroleum,
natural gas, and uranium reserves on Zapatista autonomous land under
the guise of cooperation with Bush's war will inevitably lead to Indian
resistance in this corner of Chiapas. Under the Bush doctrine of either
being "with us or with the terrorists", resistance to supplying Washington's
war efforts could be tantamount to terrorism itself.

The gathering war clouds and deepening world recession have hit Chiapas
like a ton of stones. Tourism, the state's second industry, has collapsed
in the wake of terrorist attack, and the price of coffee, Chiapas's
key agricultural export, has toppled to its lowest level in a generation,
thrusting 500 Indian farmers a month into the migration stream north
to the U.S. Whole communities as spread as Nuevo Huistan near the heart
of the jungle, and San Juan Chamula in the highlands, are now dependent
upon remissions from "El Norte." In both those communities, reports
Fray Bart's Pineda, families say they have not heard from their men
since Black Tuesday.

The Zapatista flame first surged in the region ten years ago when
the bottom fell out of the coffee market and NAFTA threatened the Mayan
corn culture. But now, with the EZLN sworn to silence, observers like
Pineda and Castro sense that the EPR will seek to fill the vacuum. "That
is when the real terrorism could begin" Pineda frets.

Although the world is dominated by Washington's super-power vision,
seven years of indigenous struggle in the Zapatistas' self-declared
"war against oblivion" contain lessons for those who are about to plunge
the planet into an excess of global revenge.

On the eve of Christmas 1997, 46 members of Las Abejas ("The Bees"),
a coffee growing and honey gathering collective organized by the San
Cristobal diocese and sympathetic to the Zapatista cause, were massacred
by fanatic Presbyterians, members of the then-ruling (71 years) Institutional
Revolutionary Party (PRI), an act designed by the military and state
police to separate the Zapatistas from their civil bases in the highlands.
Given the smallness of the Abeja community, the killings can be quantified
as an act of terror comparable to ten World Trade Center disasters.
Nonetheless, the return of hundreds of Abeja families in recent months
to communities from which they were once forced to flee under threat
of death, seems to underscore that a modicum of reconciliation is still
possible between the terrorized and the terrorists.

John Ross, author of "The War Against Oblivion - Zapatista Chronicles",
the seven year saga of the Mayan Indian rebellion he has been covering
since its earliest hours, and a new chapbook of poetry "Against Amnesia",
will soon be leaving on an extended U.S. book tour. For those who have
invited Ross to speak in many venues across the U.S., this will be the
last "Mexico Barbaro" he will be able to personally distribute.

Those who have become addicted to these weekly glimpses from the Mexican
underbelly should write David Wilson at nicadlw@earthlink.net and take
out a subscription. For regular readers, "Mexico Barbaro" will appear
at ten day intervals until Ross returns south in December.

FROM CHIAPAS RIGHTS
ACTION
October 11, 2001

Call for action: Indigenous Rights in Chiapas. Please contact the
Mexican embassy or consular offices in your country or region, to help
educate concerning Indigenous Rights in Chiapas.

This information is distributed by Rights Action. For four years,
Rights Action has supported the creative and courageous work of both
the

"Chiapas Community Defenders Network" and the "La Voz de Cerro Hueco".
[If you would like to support the work of these 2 organizations, please
contact: info@rightsaction.org]

To local, national and international civil society and the press:

Please Support The Zapatistas & Help Them Set A Precedent For
Indigenous Rights Around The World As They Hold The Mexican
Government Accountable To The International Treaty On Indigenous Rights,
Justice, And Self-Determination

* What: Fax, E-mail, Phone and Letter Campaign demanding that the
Mexican government comply with International Labor Organization Convention
169 which recognizes basic human rights including living on and defending
ancestral lands (see sample letter below)

* When: Friday, October 12, 2001 all day

* Where: Your local Mexican Consulate (Fax, E-mail, Phone)

* Why: On October 12, the Chiapas Community Defenders Network is filing
one of three cases with the International Labor Organization (ILO) demanding
that the Mexican government comply with Convention 169 on Indigenous
and Tribal Peoples. ILO Convention 169 was ratified by the Mexican government
in 1990, but continues to be blatantly disregarded.

The Chiapas Community Defenders Network (La Red de Defensores) is
a network of indigenous Zapatista representatives defending human rights
in their communities, including those of non-Zapatistas. All members
are elected by their communities and trained in Mexican and international
human rights law.

On October 12 they will file the first of three cases against Mexico
for its failure to comply with Convention 169 of the International Labor
Organization (ILO). In 1990, Mexico ratified ILO Convention 169 which
obligates state governments to recognize and strengthen the rights of
indigenous populations in the following respects:

� The right to land
� The right to be consulted in decisions that affect them
� The right to respect for their own institutions and customs
� The right to manage and control their own development

The Zapatistas (along with the vast majority of indigenous groups
in Mexico) are calling attention to the programmed flaws of the recently
passed indigenous reform, concern over the increasing militarization
of their home regions, as well as outrage over the continued government
occupation of 3 "withdrawn" bases in the conflict zone.

The first case, which focuses on paramilitary activity and state complicity,
will be filed October 12. The other two cases, which challenge the validity
of the recently passed indigenous law and the legitimacy of presidential
land expropriations and militarization in Chiapas, will be presented
at a later date.

In 1996, the San Andres Accords were signed by the Mexican government
and the Zapatistas. However, peace negotiations stalled when the government
failed to submit the resulting legislative proposal, already a compromise
for the Zapatistas, to the Senate. Disheartened by the blatant show
of disrespect, the EZLN demanded 5 signs that the government was serious
about negotiations which the Zedillo administration never fulfilled.

When Fox was elected President, the Zapatistas reduced the number
to 3 signs as a show of good faith. Unfortunately, the Fox administration
has NOT FOLLLOWED THROUGH on those three signs. The three signs are:
1 - implementation of the San Andres Accords, through the Cocopa proposal,

2 - the liberation of all Zapatista political prisoners, and 3 - the
withdrawal of the military from 7 key bases in the conflict zone.

To the disappointment of indigenous groups all over Mexico, the Reform
on Indigenous Rights and Culture, signed into effect just last August,
refuses to recognize indigenous representatives and governing structures.
The Reform also subordinates community control of land use and ownership
to national private property law. Already the Mexican government has
opened the Lacandon jungle in the conflict region of Chiapas to petroleum
drilling, bio-prospecting and wood pulp plantations, disregarding the
fragility of jungle biodiversity.

Furthermore, the Puebla-Panama Plan promoted by Vicente Fox will run
miles of highways through southeaster Mexico, displacing thousands from
their homes and communities to search for work along the U.S.-Mexico
border or to work for dimes in regional assembly lines.

To date, 9 Zapatista political prisoners remain incarcerated in Chiapas,
Tabasco and Quer�taro under false charges. Zapatista political prisoner
organization La Voz de Cerro Hueco considers them to be hostages of
the government, pawns to be used to force the Zapatistas to cave in
on their demands. The military has not withdrawn from the 7 bases, but
actually relocated to old and new bases and checkpoints. 3 of the "withdrawn"
bases remain under government control and the lands have not been returned
to neighboring Zapatista communities.

According to the Chiapas Community Defenders, over 104 military operations
have taken place between April and July of 2001, while paramilitary
harassment and attacks have only increased. In fact, 11 members of the
government-created and sponsored paramilitary group Paz y

Justicia, those responsible for the church massacre in Acteal of 45
unarmed civilians on February 26, 1996, were released after serving
only 5 months in prison.

The Zapatistas rose up in 1994 on January 1st, the day NAFTA was enacted,
proposing community control of their (and our) destiny. Please support
them in their efforts.

(IC)TUESDAY, AUGUST
14, 2001

The Zapatista National Liberation Front on Monday said Mexican President
Vicente Fox has ordered Army troops to the southern state of Chiapas.
The Indian rights group said they feared an attack. But the Army wouldn't
confirm or deny the report of troop movement to Chiapas. Congress has
certified an Indian-rights bill but most Indian leaders, and the Zapatistas,
have rejected it as watered down.

Zapatistas: Mexico is sending troops to a rebel strongholds

By Alejandro Ruiz
Associated Press
8/14/2001

SAN CRISTOBAL DE LAS CASAS, Mexico (AP) Zapatista rebels say the Mexican
army is dispatching troops to one of their most important strongholds.
In the statement Monday, the Zapatista National Liberation Front said
President Vicente Fox had personally ordered the buildup of troops near
the highlands town of San Andres Larrainsar, in southernmost Chiapas
state.

The arrival of "hundreds of troops is causing tension for those living
in our communities because we are afraid Mr. Vicente Fox is preparing
a military attack," the communique said.

A Mexican army spokesman said Monday night that he had not seen the
rebel communique and could not comment on its contents. He refused to
discuss the movement of state forces in Chiapas.

Tensions have run high in Chiapas since last month, when Congress
approved a watered-down version of an Indian rights bill that was supposed
to put an end to the Zapatistas' seven-year uprising. The initiative
was first drafted in 1996 during peace talks between the government
and the rebels, who had risen up in a short-lived rebellion in the name
of Indian rights two years earlier.

But then-President Ernesto Zedillo rejected it, saying it would compromise
Mexican sovereignty and unity. The rebels stormed out of the talks and
have never resumed negotiations with the government.

The Zapatistas want regional autonomy for Indian areas on issues such
as native languages, traditional forms of government and a share of
the resources taken from their lands.

Mexico Ratifies Rights Law Over Indian Objections

JUL 12, 2001
By REUTERS

ETMEXICO CITY (Reuters)
- Mexico ratified landmark constitutional reforms on Thursday to strengthen
Indian rights, though indigenous communities that inspired the bill
dismissed it as useless in saving the Chiapas peace process.

State legislatures in Michoacan and Nayarit ratified the set of amendments
known as the indigenous rights law, bringing the number of states approving
it to 17. That was more than the majority of Mexico's 31 states required
to change the Constitution. But ratification came over rejection by
states with large Indian populations and opposition from indigenous
leaders.

"This reform will be born dead," the governors and leading lawmakers
in heavily indigenous Chiapas and Oaxaca states said in a letter published
in the Milenio newspaper on Thursday.

Only months ago the reforms were seen as crucial to ending an impasse
with the Zapatista rebels in Chiapas, who rose up in arms in 1994 to
defend Indian rights. But the rebel leadership and Indian supporters
denounced the final version as a mockery of their demands and an obstacle
to peace, arguing it gutted the original proposal for greater self-determination
by Indian communities.

Chiapas, where more than 35 percent of the population is Indian, rejected
the bill that was specifically designed to answer the Zapatista uprising.Oaxaca,
where more than half the residents are Indians, also rejected it. Together,
the nine states that rejected the bill are home to more than half of
Mexico's nearly 10 million indigenous citizens.

The remaining states had yet to vote."We have always said this was
an aborted law that did not meet the expectations of the indigenous,"
said federal deputy Hector Sanchez, head of the congressional Indigenous
Affairs Committee and a Zapoteca Indian from Oaxaca.

REFORMS ILLEGITIMATE

Community opposition renders the reforms illegitimate and should prompt
the federal government to consider new, farther-reaching guarantees
of Indian rights, activists said. "The fact that the communities and
state legislatures are rejecting this is a very solid argument to sensitize
the federal Congress," said Chiapas Gov. Pablo Salazar

.The constitutional reforms take effect once the states notify the
national Congress of ratification. The executive branch then certifies
the amendments.

Since taking office last December, President Vicente Fox has seen his
hopes dashed for a return to peace talks in Chiapas, stalled since 1996,
despite key government concessions to the Zapatistas and a historic
cross-country tour by the rebel leadership to rally support for Indian
rights. The rebels rejected the rights bill passed by the national Congress
in April and returned to their Chiapas stronghold.

Supporters of the final bill, including leaders of Fox's National Action
Party, said it met indigenous demands for greater autonomy while preserving
national sovereignty and individual rights under the Constitution

.Fox initially hailed the Congress's passage of the bill as a major
step toward peace, but his government later backed away from the final
version, calling it a good faith step rather than a full answer to Indian
demands.

The Mexico Solidarity Network is calling on all Community
Organizations, Grassroots Groups, and Non-Governmental Organizations
to sign onto the following letter in solidarity with the National Indigenous
Congress (CNI) and the Zapatistas. The letter will be delivered to the Mexican Embassy
in Washington, DC on May 18th with copies going to the COCOPA and the
Mexican Congress. If you would like to sign on to the letter below,
please e-mail the Mexico Solidarity Network at msn@mexicosolidarity.org.

WHY? On April 28th, Mexico's 12 million indigenous
people and their supporters throughout Mexico and the world were startled
to learn that the Mexican Senate passed a law claiming to address the
problems regarding the Indigenous rights, culture and land issues.

President Fox, the corporate media, and political pundits in Mexico
proclaimed success at the passage of the law, and (again) declared that
peace had been acheived in the Zapatista conflict. However, many indigenous
people were left angered and disappointed with Congress' action. Immediately,
the National Indigenous Congress (CNI) and the Zapatistas denounced
the law as deceptive and a betrayal of the dialogue process.

The original proposal, known as the COCOPA Law, was based on the San
Andres Accords, signed between President Zedillo's government and the
Zapatistas in Feb. 1996. The Zapatistas have called for the passage
of this measure as a pre-condition to re-start the dialogue that has
been suspended since September 1996.

The COCOPA proposal provides autonomy for indigenous communities throughout
Mexico by giving them control over land, natural resources, local governance,
judicial matters, education and health care. This law creates The Senate
altered the COCOPA proposal in significant ways and indigenous people
are left with a flowery document that sounds nice but does little to
change the oppressive relationships that have characterized the past
509 years.

If you would like to sign on to the letter below, please e-mail the
Mexico Solidarity Network at msn@mexicosolidarity.org.

We the undersigned are writing to express our deep concern regarding
the Mexican Senate's version of the Indigenous Rights Law. This law
in no way reflects the original COCOPA proposal, which you introduced
to Congress, or the San Andr�s accords, signed by the EZLN and the government
in 1996. While the new proposal includes general language concerning
Indigenous Rights and Culture, it excludes key aspects of the original
COCOPA proposal such as the right to autonomy and free determination,
the recognition of indigenous territories, the recognition of indigenous
communities as legal entities, the collective use and benefit of natural
resources and the association of indigenous communities and counties.

We are very concerned that this proposal represents a step backwards
in the peace prosess for Chiapas. As international citizens concerned
about the rights of indigenous peoples and the peace process in Chiapas,
we strongly urge you to reject the Senate version and insist on immediate
implementation of the original COCOPA proposal in its complete and unaltered
form.

Sincerely,

The Mexico Solidarity Network, ETC

The Mexico Solidarity Network is calling on all Community
Organizations, Grassroots Groups, and Non-Governmental Organizations
to sign onto the following letter in solidarity with the National Indigenous
Congress (CNI) and the Zapatistas. The letter will be delivered to the Mexican Embassy
in Washington, DC on May 18th with copies going to the COCOPA and the
Mexican Congress. If you would like to sign on to the letter below,
please e-mail the Mexico Solidarity Network at msn@mexicosolidarity.org.

WHY? On April 28th, Mexico's 12 million indigenous
people and their supporters throughout Mexico and the world were startled
to learn that the Mexican Senate passed a law claiming to address the
problems regarding the Indigenous rights, culture and land issues.

President Fox, the corporate media, and political pundits in Mexico
proclaimed success at the passage of the law, and (again) declared that
peace had been acheived in the Zapatista conflict. However, many indigenous
people were left angered and disappointed with Congress' action. Immediately,
the National Indigenous Congress (CNI) and the Zapatistas denounced
the law as deceptive and a betrayal of the dialogue process.

The original proposal, known as the COCOPA Law, was based on the San
Andres Accords, signed between President Zedillo's government and the
Zapatistas in Feb. 1996. The Zapatistas have called for the passage
of this measure as a pre-condition to re-start the dialogue that has
been suspended since September 1996.

The COCOPA proposal provides autonomy for indigenous communities throughout
Mexico by giving them control over land, natural resources, local governance,
judicial matters, education and health care. This law creates The Senate
altered the COCOPA proposal in significant ways and indigenous people
are left with a flowery document that sounds nice but does little to
change the oppressive relationships that have characterized the past
509 years.

If you would like to sign on to the letter below, please e-mail the
Mexico Solidarity Network at msn@mexicosolidarity.org.

We the undersigned are writing to express our deep concern regarding
the Mexican Senate's version of the Indigenous Rights Law. This law
in no way reflects the original COCOPA proposal, which you introduced
to Congress, or the San Andr�s accords, signed by the EZLN and the government
in 1996. While the new proposal includes general language concerning
Indigenous Rights and Culture, it excludes key aspects of the original
COCOPA proposal such as the right to autonomy and free determination,
the recognition of indigenous territories, the recognition of indigenous
communities as legal entities, the collective use and benefit of natural
resources and the association of indigenous communities and counties.

We are very concerned that this proposal represents a step backwards
in the peace prosess for Chiapas. As international citizens concerned
about the rights of indigenous peoples and the peace process in Chiapas,
we strongly urge you to reject the Senate version and insist on immediate
implementation of the original COCOPA proposal in its complete and unaltered
form.

Sincerely,

The Mexico Solidarity Network, ETC

Originally
published in Spanish by the FZLN
Translated by irlandesa

To the People of Mexico.

On this May 1, 2001, we, the workers of the city and of the countryside
ARE DENOUNCING that:

THE DEPUTIES AND SENATORS OF THE CONGRESS OF THE UNION USURPED THE
POPULAR WILL. The Chamber of the Senate, unanimously, and the Chamber
of Deputies, with 386 votes from the PAN, PRI and PVEM, have betrayed
the sovereign will of the people, the demand by millions of indigenous
and non-indigenous Mexicans who, through a multitude of peaceful demonstrations,
have expressed our demand for the constitutional recognition of the
rights of the Indian peoples contained in the Cocopa proposal. Heedful
of the interests of their party leaders, of their personal and group
interests, the Congress is imposing a law which is closer to Zedillo's,
which has nothing to do with the Cocopa proposal on Indigenous Rights
and Culture, which recognize rights but makes it impossible for them
to be exercised, which continues to leave millions of indigenous Mexican
brothers as second-class citizens, excluded. How much more indigenous
blood do those "representatives," - who live off the people's money
- want? How much more blood of honest Mexicans will be necessary for
THOSE WHO GOVERN, TO GOVERN OBEYING and FOR THOSE WHO LEGISLATE, TO
LEGISLATE OBEYING THE MANDATE OF THE PEOPLE?

This same Congress, a fitting heir to Zedillo, is the same one going
about putting taxes on medicines, food and schools, while protecting
with its laws bankers who continue to take the money out of our country.
The same one which is more concerned about changing the laws in order
to allow casinos than about the rights of retired persons and pensioners.
The same one which is preparing to promote a labor counter-reform
which will demolish what was fought for the entire 20th century, and
which will leave us completely at the mercy of the savage capitalism
which the legislators themselves are protecting. Because of all of
this, we are saying: THIS CONGRESS DOES NOT REPRESENT US.

We will not be resigned, we have dignity, we shall continue to fight,
we shall continue to resist until, in this our Patria, there is: Liberty!
Democracy! Justice! for all Mexicans.

TRANSFORMATION
OF THE COCOPA PROPOSAL INTO CONSTITUTIONAL LAW!

LIBERTY FOR ZAPATISTA PRISONERS!

NO TO THE IVA!

NO TO THE CONGRESS AND TO THE GOVERNMENT WHO SERVE ONLY THE RICH!

YES TO DIALOGUE AND ORGANIZATION BETWEEN ALL THE EXCLUDED AND OPPRESSED!

Zapatista Front of National Liberation (FZLN)

Zapatistas reject Indian
rights bill
Rebels break off all contact with Mexican government

May 1, 2001
ASSOCIATED PRESS

SAN CRISTOBAL DE LAS CASAS, Mexico, April 30 - Mexico's Zapatista
rebels broke off all contacts with the government Monday and called
upon supporters to protest against an Indian rights bill their leader
said failed to meet rebels' demands.

SUBCOMANDANTE MARCOS, the rebels' leader, said the bill, modified
by the Senate and passed by both houses of Congress last week, weakened
clauses guaranteeing autonomy and self-determination contained in
accords reached in 1996 by Zapatistas and members of a government
peace commission.

"With this reform, federal legislators and the Fox government close
the door to dialogue and peace," Marcos said in a communique issued
from the rebel's jungle base in the southern state of Chiapas.

"It sabotages the incipient process of reconciliation between the
government and the Zapatista National Liberation Army."

Marcos criticized President Vicente Fox for praising the bill. "In
this way, Fox demonstrates that he only pretended to make the initial
agreement his, while he negotiated with hard-line sectors of Congress
a reform that doesn't recognize the rights of the indigenous communities."

The Zapatistas want regional autonomy for Indian areas on issues
like native languages and traditional government and law based on
councils of elders or village assemblies.

In Congress' version of the bill, autonomy would be more locally
based, and state legislatures would have to enact those customs into
law.

The original version also established Indians' communal rights to
land and natural resources. Congress inserted language protecting
private land holdings in Indian areas and said Indians would have
preference, but not sole rights, to natural resources in their territories.

REBELS' SIGNATURE CAUSE

The Zapatistas launched a short-lived revolution in the name of
Indian rights on Dec. 1, 1994. More than 140 people died in 12 days
of fighting. While the rebels have not been a major military threat
since, they have mounted a successful campaign to demand that Mexico
rethink its treatment of its 10 million Indians.

Passage of the bill was one of the three conditions the Zapatistas
established to reopen peace talks. Submitting the bill to Congress
was Fox's first official act after taking office in December.

The Senate unanimously passed a modified version Wednesday. The
lower house of Congress overwhelmingly approved it Saturday.

Pablo Salazar, the Chiapas governor elected by a coalition of political
parties, including Fox's National Action Party and the leftist Democratic
Revolution Party, also rejected the bill Monday, saying it represented
a "triumph for conservatism" in Mexico.

Mexican Indian Rights
Bill Raises Fears

April 19, 2001
by Fiona Ortiz and Adriana Barrera
Reuters

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - They have been revered as folkloric icons,
patronized as ignorant poor folk, or completely ignored. For hundreds
of years Mexico has treated its Indian peoples with extreme ambivalence.

A new bill before Congress is meant to vindicate Indian rights by
reforming seven articles of the constitution, but critics fear the
proposed new law would give too much power to local Indian governments.

Promoters of Indian rights law, born out of the Zapatista rebellion
which claims that the globalization of the world economy threatens
Indians, say it will finally enshrine rights and respect for 10 million
Mexicans who are Indian, or one tenth of the nation.

But there are concerns are that such a law would endanger the environment
by giving Indian groups total control over natural resources on their
lands; allow Indian communities to legally discriminate against women
under traditions known as ''uses and customs''; and undermine Mexico's
ideal of mixed blood.

Mexicans claim pride in mestizaje, the mingling of European conquerors
and Indians. But many -- even dark-skinned Mexicans with Indian features
-- openly look down on people who speak Spanish with the accent of
an Indian tongue.

A Long-Stalled Bill

The bill was drafted during peace talks between the government and
the Zapatista National Liberation Army, which took up arms to fight
for Indian rights in 1994. The peace talks fell apart in 1996 and
the bill gathered dust for years.

Then President Vicente Fox (news - web sites), the first Mexican
leader to come from outside the long-ruling Institutional Revolutionary
Party (PRI) in 71 years, took office in December.

Acting on campaign promises to end the low-level conflict with the
Zapatistas in southern Mexico, and holding out an olive branch to
the rebels, Fox sent the bill to Congress, where his National Action
Party (PAN) must gather support from the PRI and the leftist Party
of the Democratic Revolution (PRD).

The reforms in the bill must be approved by two-thirds of the 128-seat
Senate and then by the 500-member lower house.

On March 28, in an unprecedented Congressional appearance by a rebel
group, Zapatista leaders wearing masks and traditional Indian clothes,
lobbied for the bill.

The proposed constitutional reforms would give Indian peoples the
right to free determination and autonomy, and the right to resolve
their own internal conflicts without violating human rights and the
dignity of women.

If passed, the law would also allow Indian villages to elect their
own authorities and to collectively use natural resources on their
lands.

It also would make the government responsible for improving Indian
education and providing interpreters and public defenders when they
are in the justice system.

Too Much Autonomy

Some experts say the proposed law is dangerous.

"It's one thing to recognize the autonomy that Indian people have
a right to, and to respect their uses and customs, their languages.
But it's another thing to convert these Indian communities into small
independent states. That would be the destruction of the country,"
said Ignacio Burgoa, a law professor at Mexico's National Autonomous
University and an expert on constitutional issues.

But Alcides Vadillo, an indigenous rights expert with the United
Nations (news - web sites) human rights office in Guatemala, says
that giving Indian communities autonomy is not incompatible with a
nation's central government.

The real problem with such laws, he said, is that they are seldom
properly implemented.

Mexican political analyst Lorenzo Meyer argues that Mexico's constitution
already guarantees Indian rights, and the law just needs to be enforced.

"The bulk of what the law wants already exists. There won't be anything
really new," Meyer said.

He says Indian communities have always been allowed to impose their
``uses and customs," without problems. For example, the obligation
to do communal work without pay has always gone unpunished, although
it's not strictly legal, he pointed out.

Uses And Customs

"Uses and customs," differ among Mexico's Indian communities. But
in many villages traditional councils of elders, usually men, make
decisions for the whole community. Sometimes the councils decide how
the whole town will vote in state and national elections.

Some critics have said that because of that, the Indian rights law
could threaten democracy in Mexico and discriminate against women.

The Zapatista's Commander Esther tried to lay to rest the fear that
Indian women would be harmed by the proposed new law, when she spoke
before Congress in March.

She said that current laws had marginalized and humiliated women
and pointed out that the Indian rights law actually contains language
to protect women.

"We, in addition to being women, are indigenous, and, as such, we
are not recognized. We know which are good and which are bad uses
and customs. The bad ones are hitting and beating a woman, buying
and selling, marrying by force against her will, not being allowed
to participate in assembly, not being able to leave the house," she
told Congress.

Meyer said the reforms as currently worded would actually force
Indian communities to modernize.

"Discrimination against women will not be allowed, they won't be
able to do that any more," he said.

WHO IS INDIAN?

Lawmakers said another drawback of the Indian rights bill was that
it would force the government to identify "authentic" Indian communities.

The lawmakers also worry that if Indian communities are free to
exploit national resources they will destroy the environment.

But Environment Minister Victor Lichtinger said that more control
will mean more protection.

"I am convinced that giving greater autonomy to Indian peoples in
their own lands, will be favorable for the conservation of those ecosystems,"
Lichtinger said.

Whatever happens to the law in Mexico, rights expert Vadillo said
the results will reverberate throughout the region, where Indian rights
are being debated within the context of greater democracy in Ecuador,
Peru, Colombia and Guatemala.

"What happens in Mexico will have an enormous political influence
on the rest of Latin America," Vadillo said.

EZLN: MILITARY BASES
TO BE TURNED OVER TO INDIANS

Mexico City, Apr 10, 2001 (EFE via COMTEX) -- EZLN guerrilla spokesperson
Fernando Yanez, alias "Comandante German," on Tuesday announced that
the Mexican army will turn over the three remaining military bases
in the southern Mexican state of Chiapas to the Indian communities
next week.

Earlier, the Mexican army dismantled four of the seven bases as
one of the conditions set by the Zapatista National Liberation Army
(EZLN) before it agrees to return to the negotiating table.

Now, however, the army will close the remaining three bases and
physically turn them over to the Indians, Yanez said.

"In doing this, the federal government is meeting one of the conditions
we demanded of them before agreeing to return to the peace talks,
and I am very satisfied with the completion of this demand," Comandante
German said in the Mexican capital.

In addition to dismantling the seven military bases in Chiapas,
the EZLN is demanding that the government release all EZLN prisoners
and approve the law on Indian rights and cultures, which the guerrillas
defended in Congress on March 28.

Yanez made this announcement after meeting with the congressional
peace commission for Chiapas (COCOPA), the author of the Indian rights
bill whose members are from all the different political parties, and
the government's Chiapas peace commissioner Luis Hector Alvarez.

"It is the will of both parties that all conditions be met," Yanez
said after speaking with Alvarez.

By order of Mexican President Vicente Fox, the dismantled military
bases in Chiapas will be turned into Indian community development
centers. The evaluation and monitoring director for the future centers,
Carlos Montemayor, said that this move is "well accepted among the
population" and that the Indians' basic necessities such as health,
education, food and productive projects are currently being studied.
EFE fm-jm/kb/bp http://www.efe.es

Mexican Guerrillas Make
Historic Congress Address

March 28, 2001

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Masked Mexican Zapatista rebels made an unprecedented
appearance before Congress on Wednesday to deliver an impassioned plea
for Indian rights but most members of President Vicente Fox's party
boycotted the historic session.

"We don't come to conquer, to supplant anyone...We come to be heard
and to listen to you and to make dialogue, " Commander Esther who spoke
first, said in stilted Spanish against a backdrop of two enormous national
flags flanked by plaques bearing names of illustrious personalities
in Mexican history.

The rebel's charismatic military strategist and spokesman, Subcommander
Marcos, was noticeably absent from the motley rebel command seated in
the front benches as Commander Esther, wearing a black knitted ski-mask
and red and white embroidered shawl, spoke to the half empty chamber.

Esther, who spoke for 25 minutes, said Marcos was absent because as
a subcommander he was of lower rank and not the sole voice of the rebels.
"We gave Marcos and those who share our hopes and yearnings the mission
to bring us to this tribune ... now is our hour. "

Four rebel commanders in all addressed senators and deputies from
the podium of the Lower House -- a privilege normally reserved for Mexican
presidents, foreign heads of states, ministers and lawmakers.

The rebels' landmark appearance before Congress was aimed at convincing
lawmakers to pass an indigenous rights bill giving greater autonomy
to Indian communities -- a key rebel condition for resuming peace talks.

The majority of deputies from Fox's conservative National Action Party
(PAN) earlier said they would not attend in protest and that they oppose
negotiating with people in masks.

Indigenous braided women wearing colorful frilly skirts and shawls
and men in white with red sashes and tasseled hats packed the public
gallery to watch the high political drama.

In response to frequently cited concerns that the Indian rights bill
would fracture the nation's unity, Esther said Mexico was already deeply
divided and that Indians lived in danger of extinction.

"In this fragmented country we Indians live with the shame of being
the color that we are, " said Esther.

The Zapatistas, who rose up in 1994 in the name of Mexico's 10 million
Indians, marched, unarmed, to the capital from their jungle hide-out
in Southern Chiapas some two weeks ago, amassing grass-roots support
during their 12-state trek.

EARLY VICTORY FOR REBELS

The event marks an early victory on the part of the rebels, who last
week threatened to return to Chiapas if they were not allowed to speak
before Congress.

Fox, who was not invited to attend the session, said he hoped the
rebels succeeded in convincing lawmakers of the importance of the indigenous
bill, which is aimed at giving greater autonomy to indigenous communities.

"Today is not the point of arrival but the point of departure so that
this, our dear Mexico, pays the enormous debt that it has with 10 million
indigenous brothers and sisters, " he said in a statement.

Three other rebel chiefs spoke after Esther's address, urging lawmakers
to approve the indigenous rights bill.

Commander David said: "For nearly 500 years, the sons and grandsons
of the (Spanish) conquerors did everything possible to exterminate us
... They imposed their laws, their ideas, their politics, beliefs and
their gods in order to make what was ours disappear. "

Commander Zebedeo said lawmakers had it in their power to right these
wrongs and open the way for peace.

"If you want to win the confidence of the Mexican people, if you want
to pay your debt, if you want to be loyal and faithful to your word
that you gave during your campaigns, now is the moment to fulfill that,
to settle accounts..., " he said.

Fox has continued this week to make concessions to the rebels who
have said they will return to the negotiating table on condition troops
are withdrawn from seven bases in the conflict zone, all rebel prisoners
are freed and a law protecting indigenous rights is passed.

Monday the government pulled out troops from the last two remaining
bases of the seven in Chiapas.

Fox, who is the first Mexican president in seven decades not a member
of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), sent the indigenous
rights bill to Congress within days of being sworn in last December.

The Zapatistas' guerrilla war -- launched on New Year's Day 1994 --
and subsequent clashes between rebel sympathizers and PRI-back paramilitaries
have claimed up to 200 lives.

Copyright CR 2001
Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.

Masked Rebels Test Mexico
Congress

John Rice, AP Writer
March 28, 2001

MEXICO CITY (AP) -- Leaving behind their jungle hide-outs and guns
-- and their controversial leader -- 23 ski-masked Zapatista rebels
strode Wednesday onto the floor of Congress and proclaimed the beginning
of a political struggle.

Rebel leader Comandante Esther said the absence of Subcomandante Marcos,
the rebels' military leader and media star, was intentional: the rebels'
military mission was over, she said.

"Our warriors have done their job. Now it is our time for respect,
" Esther told hundreds of legislators. "The person speaking to you is
not the military leader of a rebel army, but the political leadership
of a legitimate movement. "

For the first time, the Zapatistas acknowledged the peace overtures
made by President Vicente Fox, who has bent over backward to meet to
their demands.

"His orders have been a sign of peace. We too will give orders of
peace to our people, " Esther said.

She and a string of rebel commanders described 500 years of repression
against Indians and argued for approval of a rights bill now before
Congress.

"It is symbolic that I, a poor Indian woman and a Zapatista, am here
today, " Esther said.

While no longer a military threat, the rebels have mounted a successful
media campaign to demand Mexico rethink its treatment of its 10 million
Indians.

That campaign has been so successful, and the rebels so unyielding,
that some legislators accused them of trying to bully congress.

"Our word is one of respect, " said Esther, who like other rebel leaders
uses only her first name. "We came to have a dialogue ... not to shove
anyone aside. "

But she went on to attack Fox's National Action Party, which opposed
their appearance in congress. Many of the party's members didn't show
up for the session.

About 100 of the 628 senators and congressmen were present, and they
gave the rebels a rousing applause. Congressional workers said more
legislators were expected to join the hours-long session later.

The rebel leaders all wore black ski masks under beribboned Indian
hats and military field caps. The masks, which have become a trademark
of their movement, anger many lawmakers who say the rebels should show
their faces.

Esther continued to suggest that the rebels still had a military capacity,
something experts doubt.

"We have ordered Subcomandante Marcos ... not to make any military
advances " on army bases Fox has ordered closed in Chiapas, she said.
The closures were part of a list of rebel demands for restarting peace
talks.

The argument over letting the rebels take the floor created a bitter
division within Mexico's newly independent Congress -- and within the
National Action Party. Its members claimed the rebel's past rhetoric
suggested they had come to lecture, not engage in a dialogue.

With National Action blocking a full joint session of congress, the
rebel leaders technically addressed a committee meeting in the main
chamber of Congress.

The absence of Marcos -- whose biting rhetoric had angered some congressmen
-- indicated a more conciliatory tone on the part of the rebels.

"Subcomandante Marcos is just that, a subcommander. We are the ones
who lead, as a group, " Esther said, referring to the other Indian rebels.
Marcos is not an Indian, though he claims elders have given him that
status.

Congress responded warmly, with Sen. Hector Sanchez giving the Zapatista
rebels a welcome in the Zapotec Indian language. It was symbolic, because
Zapotec is spoken in Oaxaca state, not Chiapas, where the rebels are
from.

Rarely if ever has a guerrilla movement gained so much -- or been
given it -- while posing such a small military threat. Actual fighting
lasted only 12 days seven years ago. More than 145 people died before
a cease-fire took hold.

But since taking office Dec. 1, ending 71 years of single-party rule,
Fox has reversed the former ruling party's policy of isolating the rebels
deep in Chiapas state. Fox has agreed to meet all of their demands,
but the Zapatistas have refused to meet with him.

At issue is constitutional amendments that would allow Indians to
govern themselves at the local level; promote their own languages, customs
and justice systems; and grant them greater land rights.

Critics worry the law could allow traditional Indian councils of elders
to discriminate against women, political or religious minorities, or
to take over nature reserves for farming.

The rebels have been loath to accept any changes in the bill, and
accused congressmen of being "racists " and "cavemen. "

Final report
on the question of the impunity of perpetrators of human rights violations
economic, social and cultural rights), prepared by Mr. El Hadji Guiss�,
Special Rapporteur, pursuant to Sub-Commission resolution 1996/24.
[E/CN.4/Sub.2/1997/8] http://www.derechos.org/nizkor/impu/guissee.html